Railway car grating



arch 24, 1959 A. E. HARDER ETAL 2,878,761

RAILWAY CAR GRATING Filed June 1, 1954 INVENTORS: Alum E. Harder BY Robert C. clerzck RAILWAY CAR GRATING Alvin E. Harder and Robert C. Roderick, Milwaukee, Wis., assignors to A. O. Smith Corporation, Milwaukee,

Wis., a corporation of New York Application June 1, 1954, Serial No. 433,402

2 Claims. (Cl. 105-457) This invention relates to a grating and particularly to a railway car grating having adjustable attachment means.

Railway car gratings are of the conventional open variety grating having a plurality of interlocked longitudinal and transverse bars. The gratings are removably United States Patent O secured to fastening brackets or saddles which are bolted to the roof of the railway car at the cross-seams between the metal sheets providing the roof for the top of the car.

- Generally, the gratings are fastened by welding lugs between adjacent longitudinal bars such that an opemng in the lug is aligned with an opening in a bracket. A

bolt passes through the openings and has a nut tightened thereon to secure the grating in place. The main disadvantage to this method of grating attachment arises as railway cars vary in construction and the cross-seams of one car are spaced entirely different from the next. Therefore, the above attachment method requires custom building of the grating for each type of car which greatly adds to the cost and inconvenience of the assembly of gratings.

In accordance with a preferred embodiment of the present invention, a longitudinally extending fastening channel is employed in the grating. The web of the fastening channel is provided with a plurality of elongated slots to receive the attachment bolts. Under another embodiment of the invention a slot extends for the entire length of the fastening channel and bolts are received therealong to attach the grating to the brackets on the car roof. The slotted construction permits attachment of a single designed grating to railway cars having varying lengths between cross-seams at which seams the attachment brackets are located.

An object of the invention is to provide an improved, readily fabricated railroad car grating having longitudinal adjustable fastening means to meet variable fastening conditions.

The drawing furnished herewith illustrates the best mode, presently contemplated, for carrying out the invention.

Referring to the drawing:

Figure 1 is a plan view of a grating attached to a railway car;

Fig. 2 is a view taken on line 2-2 of Figure 1;

Fig. 3 is a perspective view of a portion of a grating to show details of the grating assembly; and

Fig. 4 is a perspective view, similar to Fig. 3, of another embodiment of the invention.

Referring to Figs. 1-3, a railroad grating is shown consisting of a plurality of parallel spaced longitudinal bars 1 and a plurality of parallel spaced transverse bars 2. The depth of the longitudinal bars 1 is greater than the depth of transverse bars 2 and the bars 1 are provided with a plurality of aligned notches 3 which receive the transverse bars 2. To provide a walking surface in a single plane, the depth of the notches 3 equals the depth 2 of the transverse bars 2 such that upon assembly of the bars 1 and 2, the top edges of both the longitudinal and the transverse bar lie in substantially the same plane. To form a unitary structure, the transverse bars 2 are securely fastened to bars l-within the notches 3 as for example; by welding.

To provide a means of securing the grating to the top of a box car, fastening channels 4 are secured to transverse bars 2 at the side of the grating. Fastening channels 4 open upwardly with the width of the web 5 of each channel formed equal to the spacing of the longitudinal bars 1 and with-the upper edge of the side walls of each channel lying in the plane of the longitudinal bars 1. The sides of the fastening channels 4 are formed with a plurality of notches 3, as in the bars 1, and the transverse bars 2 are secured within the notches 3 of the bars 4 in the same manner as secured within the bars 1.

To further strengthen the grating, the ends of the transverse bars 2 are crimped against the outer wall of the fastening channels 4, as at 6.

In order to provide the channels 4 with fastening means, elongated slots 7 are punched or otherwise formed in the web 5 of each of the fastening channels 4, between the respective transverse bars 2.

,Asuitable method of fabricating the fastening channels 4 is to start with a metal blank equal to the length of the finished grating and with a width equal to thedepth of the bars 1 and the desired spacing between longitudinal bars. The notches 3 and slots 7 are punched out of the blank after which the blank is formed into the channel shape, as illustrated in the drawing.

The grating forms a unitary welded structure which is simply and quickly installed or removed from the roof 8 of a railroad car, as hereinafter described.

As shown in Figs. 1 and 2, the assembled grating is bolted to a plurality of fastening brackets or saddles 9 which are secured to each seam 10 of the roof 8 of a railway car by bolts 11. The seams 10 of the roof are formed by equally upstanding flanges 12 of adjoining metal roof sheets which extend over the top of the car. A generally inverted U-shaped cap 13 is secured over the flange 12 to seal the joint therebetween.

The saddles 9 extend across the central portion of the roof 8 somewhat greater than the width of the grating to be attached. The saddles 9 are angle-shaped having a vertical leg 14 bolted to the upstanding seams 10 of the railway car roof 8 and a horizontal leg 15 as the bearing surface to which the grating is afiixed. Although the roof is downwardly sloped from the center of the roof outwardly, the saddle 9 is bolted to the seams 10 to maintain the horizontal leg 15 of the saddle 9 in a single plane, as shown in Fig. 2. The horizontal leg 15 of each saddle 9 is provided with transversely spaced apertures which correspond in spacing to the spacing of the grating side bars 4 such that the apertures are transversely aligned with the slots 7 in the grating.

The grating is set on the saddles 9 with the saddle apertures and slots 7 in alignment and the fastening bolts 16 are inserted therethrough. The nuts 17 are drawn up on the bolts to securely fasten the grating in position.

Instead of being provided'with intermittent slots the fastening channel may be formed with a single longitudinally extending slot.

Thus in Fig. 4, the fastening channel 18 comprises a pair of generally L-shaped members having their horizontal legs 19 opposed to form the web of the channel and spaced from each other to provide a longitudinal slot 20 that extends the entire length of the web. The grating is assembled on the roof 8 of the railway car with the slot 20 aligned with the saddle apertures and 3 then bolted to the saddle in the same manner as the grating shown in Figs. 1-3.

With the slotted channel construction described a grating may be readily adjusted longitudinally of a railway car to align the slot means in the grating with the apertures of the brackets or saddles 'to which the grating is to be attached.

The construction provides a grating which is applicable 'to various railway cars irrespective of the longitudinal spacing of the seams at which the brackets or saddles are located.

Various modes of carrying out the invention are contemplated as within the scope of the following claims particularly pointing out and distinctly claiming the subject matter which is regarded as the invention.

We claim:

1. The combination with supports having apertured openings at a plurality of points, of a grating comprising a plurality of transversely spaced longitudinal bars, a plurality of longitudinally spaced transverse bars interlocked with said longitudinal bars, a fastening channel secured to the transverse bars with the side walls of the channel constituting corresponding longitudinal bars of the grating and extending parallel with said longitudinal bars, the said channel having a web with opening means in said web aligned with the respective apertured openings in the support to which the grating maybe assembled irrespective of the spacing of the supports, and securing means adapted to extend through the opening means of the channel and through the respective apertured opening of the selected support to secure the grating and support together.

2. The combination with supports having apertured openings at a plurality of points, of a grating comprising a plurality of transversely spaced longitudinal bars, a plurality of longitudinally spaced transverse bars interlocked with said longitudinal bars, a fastening channel secured to the transverse bars with the side walls of the channel constituting corresponding longitudinal bars of the grating and extending parallel with said longitudinal bars, the said channel having a web with intermittent elongated slots in said web aligned with the respective apertured openings of the support with which the grating may be assembled irrespective of the spacing of the supports, and securing means adapted to extend through the opening means of the channel and through the re spective apertured opening of the selected support to secure the grating and support together.

References Cited in the file of this patent UNITED STATES PATENTS 1,343,281 Reisinger June 15, 1920 1,4 8,230 Hess Sept. 5, 1922 1,611,316 Nagin Dec. 21, 1926 2,131,174 Hawksworth Sept. 24, 1938 2,139,309 Linden Dec. 6, 1938 2,278,191 Burnett Mar. 31, 1942 2,656,903 Kerrigan Oct. 27, 1953 2,672,828 Swann Mar. 23, 1954 2,748,459 Orr June 5, 1956 FOREIGN PATENTS 676,695 France Nov. 29, 1929 

